State posts list of Whatcom County businesses that could get pot retail licenses

The Washington Liquor Control Board has posted a list of businesses in Bellingham and unincorporated Whatcom County selected by lottery to possibly receive retail marijuana licenses.

At 42, the total is still well above the number of retail stores the state allocated for the region. Whatcom County was allowed 15 retail licenses - six in Bellingham, one each in Ferndale and Lynden, and seven others countywide.

The state received 78 applications for those 15 slots, with the number of applications narrowed April 21-25 through lotteries.

Lotteries were held for areas that had too many retail applications. As such, no lottery was held for Lynden or Ferndale.

The businesses also received rankings in the lottery, although a favorable ranking doesn't guarantee a license.

Applicants must meet other requirements that include passing a criminal background check and financial investigation, as well as having a 1,000-foot buffer from schools, parks or other areas specified by Initiative 502 as being places where children gather.

If an applicant doesn't meet all requirements, the liquor board will go to the next ranked business.

Whatcom County at large - meaning rural areas - had 15 retail applicants selected by lottery, with a business called Green Stop in Maple Falls receiving the top ranking.

Bellingham had 27, with Cascade Herb Co. getting the No. 1 spot. The ranking means, for example, that the first six on the list will get a state license to open up a pot store in the city if they meet the liquor board's requirements.

The initial list also showed eight different applications for the same address at 218 N. Samish Way, split into suites.

"There's nothing we could do to prevent a landlord from promising the property to multiple people. That's an agreement between the landlord and applicant," liquor board spokesman Mikhail Carpenter said.

That North Samish Way parcel also is a vacant lot right now, according to Whatcom County property records.

Carpenter said retail hopefuls didn't need the address of an existing building to apply.

"They have to have some sort of right to that property," he said, adding that there were a limited number of properties for such businesses given the 1,000-foot buffer and other requirements.

City planners have had preliminary discussions with Yin-Ho Lai and Lorraine Lai, of Mercer Island, about building a single-story, 2,900-square-foot building with six parking spaces at that location.

The retail lottery list also shows some businesses, such as Cascade Herb Co., applying for multiple licenses.

Carpenter said each business can have as many as three retail licenses, provided that total isn't more than 33 percent of the available licenses in a jurisdiction.

Here's the list of local lottery "winners" from the state liquor board: